In situ forming hydrogel as a tracer and degradable lacrimal plug for dry eye treatment

M Dai, K Xu, D Xiao, Y Zheng, Q Zheng… - Advanced …, 2022 - Wiley Online Library
M Dai, K Xu, D Xiao, Y Zheng, Q Zheng, J Shen, Y Qian, W Chen
Advanced Healthcare Materials, 2022Wiley Online Library
Lacrimal plug is an effective and widely therapeutic strategy to treat dry eye. However,
almost all commercialized plugs are fixed in a certain design and associated with many
complications, such as spontaneous plug extrusion, epiphora, and granuloma and cannot
be traced in the long‐term. Herein, a simple in situ forming hydrogel is developed as a tracer
and degradable lacrimal plug to achieve the best match with the irregular lacrimal passages.
In this strategy, methacrylate‐modified silk fibroin (SFMA) is served as a network, and a self …
Abstract
Lacrimal plug is an effective and widely therapeutic strategy to treat dry eye. However, almost all commercialized plugs are fixed in a certain design and associated with many complications, such as spontaneous plug extrusion, epiphora, and granuloma and cannot be traced in the long‐term. Herein, a simple in situ forming hydrogel is developed as a tracer and degradable lacrimal plug to achieve the best match with the irregular lacrimal passages. In this strategy, methacrylate‐modified silk fibroin (SFMA) is served as a network, and a self‐assembled indocyanine green fluorescence tracer nanoparticle (FTN) is embedded as an indicator to develop the hydrogel plug using visible photo‐crosslinking. This SFMA/FTN hydrogel plug has excellent biocompatibility and biodegradability, which can be noninvasively monitored by near‐infrared light. In vivo tests based on dry eye rabbits show that the SFMA/FTN hydrogel plug can completely block the lacrimal passages and greatly improve the various clinical indicators of dry eye. These results demonstrate that the SFMA/FTN hydrogel is suitable as an injectable and degradable lacrimal plug with a long‐term tracking function. The work offers a new approach to the development of absorbable plugs for the treatment of dry eye.
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